American Tradition Partnership – OpenSecrets Newshttps://www.opensecrets.org/news
Breaking news, original reporting, and investigative journalism *on money in politics from the Center for Responsive PoliticsMon, 19 Nov 2018 22:04:28 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.8American Tradition Partnership Files First 990, Reveals Littlehttps://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/02/american-tradition-partnership-file/
https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/02/american-tradition-partnership-file/#respondThu, 21 Feb 2013 11:23:00 +0000American Tradition Partnership -- formerly known as Western Tradition Partnership -- has an unusual history of political antics. In January, for instance, a Montana judge found that the group used "subterfuge" to avoid disclosing its donors. OpenSecrets.org has obtained the first 990 form the group has filed with the IRS -- but it sheds little light on ATP's activities.

]]>American Tradition Partnership — formerly known as Western Tradition Partnership — has an unusual history of political antics. In January, in the latest development in a years-long legal battle, a Montana judge found that the group used “subterfuge” to avoid disclosing its donors by setting up a front group to attack state candidates in 2008. The group also stands accused — with support from a cache of documents found in a Colorado meth house and featured in a Frontline documentary last year — of illegally coordinating with legislative candidates in the 2010 elections.

On the other hand, ATP notched a significant victory when it challenged Montana’s century-old ban on some types of corporate spending in elections, which ended with a U.S. Supreme Court decision last year that effectively applied the Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision to all states and localities.

None of this, not surprisingly, is mentioned on the controversial nonprofit’s first tax form 990 on record, obtained by OpenSecrets.org. ATP is a 501(c)(4) group under tax law, meaning it is supposed to be devoted to furthering the “social welfare.” But despite the fact that it has been active since 2008, the group does not appear to have filed any 990s prior to this one, which covers the year 2011.

The tax form shows that ATP brought in $122,542 in 2011. That plus the $54,088 it reports having had in the bank at the beginning of the year allowed the group to spend $176,101 and end the year with a tiny balance of $529. That’s not a lot of money, but 2011 was an off-year.

The form also indicates the group had four individuals on its unpaid board of directors: Peter MacKenzie, Jack Wells, Dan Reed and Doug Lair.

Lair signed the group’s 990 form. He was also the lead plaintiff on a lawsuit that led to a temporary suspension of Montana’s contribution limits last year, and has sometimes been referred to as the Montana state director of the group. Jack Wells is a Montana state legislator; MacKenzie is involved in real estate; and Reed has been cited on at least one occasion as a spokesman for ATP.

But the form offers precious little other information. For example, the group apparently made no grants to other organizations, and had no highly-paid contractors. Its biggest expenses, according to the filing, were unspecified “Program Events,” ($60,449) and “Contract Services” ($38,480).

And the tax form makes no mention of political activity.

Where it’s supposed to state its “primary exempt purpose,” ATP wrote that it “is dedicated to fighting environmental extremism and promoting responsible development and management of land, water and natural resources through a voluntary, free-market approach.”

How does it do this? “We achieve these goals by educating citizens, analyzing public policy, grassroots lobbying and litigation,” the document states. No mention there of politics at all — although “grassroots lobbying” and “educating citizens” are terms sometimes used as euphemisms by shadow money groups that run political ads critical of candidates.

Attempts to reach ATP for comment were unsuccessful.

Despite having just about emptied its bank account by the end of 2011, ATP must have gotten busy fundraising: Last year, the group sent attack mailers against Republicans it considered too liberal, as well as against Democrats. ATP’s sister 501(c)(3), American Tradition Institute, also recently made its annual filing with the IRS. It claims to have taken in $320,000, but it tells the agency that it conducted “no political activity this year.”

It’s unclear what’s in ATP’s future. There are no posts on its blog more recent than Jan. 2 — about the time Donald Ferguson, the group’s director, left, and the Montana judge made his finding. Furthermore, according to state officials, the documents that were found in the meth house were subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in December, from which more may be heard in coming months.

And maybe worst of all for groups like ATP: Last week, Montana’s Democratic governor and a Republican state senator teamed up behind a bill, introduced by the senator, that would force groups funding political attacks there to disclose their donors.

]]>https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/02/american-tradition-partnership-file/feed/0Capital Eye Opener, Jan. 17: Shadow Money Group Slammed in Montana Courts, the Latest in Waldron v. Bachmann, and Morehttps://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/01/capital-eye-opener-jan-17-shadow-mo/
https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/01/capital-eye-opener-jan-17-shadow-mo/#respondThu, 17 Jan 2013 08:00:00 +0000Shadow money groups take another hit at the state level as a Montana judge rules Western Tradition Partnership used "subterfuge" to avoid disclosing its donors and posting required disclaimers. And former Michele Bachmann presidential campaign staffer Peter Waldron sticks another needle in his voodoo doll with a complaint to the FEC about how Bachmann paid a consultant.

CASTING A SHADOW: A Montana district court judge’s recent finding that Western Tradition Partnership used a front organization to avoid disclosing its donors is the latest action by state officials to go after politically active shadow money groups.

WTP, now called American Tradition Partnership, is registered as a tax-exempt social welfare nonprofit, a 501(c)(4) in IRS parlance, and is therefore not allowed to exist solely for political reasons and is not required to disclose its donors.

Judge Jeffrey Sherlock, in a finding released Jan. 4, said that WTP funded campaign flyers attacking various state and local candidates in the 2008 elections for political gain — not for the educational benefit of the public, as its nonprofit status would require. Sherlock also noted that those flyers did not identify WTP as the financial source behind the flyers and that WTP used “subterfuge” to avoid disclosing its donors and complying with state disclaimer laws.

Western Tradition Partnership has gained national prominence for its efforts to fight campaign finance restrictions; it succeeded in seeing that the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision was extended to all states, for example. The group was at the center of an investigation by PBS Frontline and ProPublica after documents found in a Colorado meth house hinted at illegal coordination between Western Tradition and state candidates.

In federal elections, 501(c)(4) nonprofits are not required to disclose their donors, though as the Center for Responsive Politics has reported, many of them appear to take advantage of their tax status to raise money anonymously and then spend it on partisan politics.

Last fall, California’s Fair Political Practices Commission required another (c)(4), Americans for Responsible Leadership, to disclose its donors. And the attorney general in New York State has proposed regulations that would require nonprofits spending money is state elections to identify their donors.

Marcus Owens, the former head of enforcement at the IRS’s nonprofit division, told PBS Frontline that the decision gives Montana the authority to regulate 501(c)(4)s if they seem to be politically active.

WTP could be fined up to three times the amount of political spending it did not report to the state, but state officials have not yet determined the amount of the fine, according to PBS Frontline.

In November, WTP became the first dark money group to disclose its donors, after a Montana district judge ordered its bank statements be made public. The statements revealed that WTP had raised more than $1 million in contributions from corporations, individuals and other nonprofits between March 2008 and December 2010, according to a joint ProPublica and PBS Frontlinereport.

ATP’s 2010 election materials promised prospective donors that unlimited contributions would be kept confidential and that the only thing they planned to report “is our success to contributors like you who can see the benefits of a program like this. You can sit back on election night and see what a difference you’ve made,” according to the Helena Independent Record.

PAC MISCONDUCT ALLEGATIONS: The latest development in the operatic duel between Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) and one of her presidential campaign’s top advisers, Peter Waldron, unfolded Tuesday. Waldron filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that Bachmann illegally used her leadership PAC funds to pay a campaign consultant.

According to Waldron, Bachmann paid fundraising consultant Guy Short with contributions from MichelePAC. The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that Bachmann’s campaign paid Short more than $104,580 between July and November 2011. MichelePAC, which Short helped Bachmann create, paid him an average of $5,000 a month.

From November until the Iowa caucuses, staffers were asked to volunteer as the campaign ran out of cash. Short claimed to be doing the same, but FEC records show that MichelePAC paid Short a total $40,000 in December 2011 and January 2012.

Waldron, a former field coordinator for Bachmann — a 2012 presidential hopeful — also claims Bachmann’s campaign is withholding some of his pay from the campaign until he signs a confidentiality agreement, as we wrote earlier this week.

To manage most of his retirement investments (valued between $600,000 and $1.3 million), Lew uses a non-profit asset manager, TIAA-CREF, which most typically provides retirement plans used by teachers, academics and researchers.

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